Mrs. Wilcox cannot be accused of giving Margaret much information
about life. And Margaret, on the other hand, has made a fair show
of modesty, and has pretended to an inexperience that she
certainly did not feel. She had kept house for over ten years;
she had entertained, almost with distinction; she had brought up
a charming sister, and was bringing up a brother. Surely, if
experience is attainable, she had attained it. Yet the little
luncheon-party that she gave in Mrs. Wilcox's honour was not a
success. The new friend did not blend with the "one or two
delightful people" who had been asked to meet her, and the
atmosphere was one of polite bewilderment. Her tastes were
simple, her knowledge of culture slight, and she was not
interested in the New English Art Club, nor in the dividing-line
between Journalism and Literature, which was started as a
conversational hare. The delightful people darted after it with
cries of joy, Margaret leading them, and not till the meal was
half over did they realise that the principal guest had taken no
part in the chase. There was no common topic. Mrs. Wilcox, whose
life had been spent in the service of husband and sons, had
little to say to strangers who had never shared it, and whose age
was half her own. Clever talk alarmed her, and withered her
delicate imaginings; it was the social counterpart of a motor-
car, all jerks, and she was a wisp of hay, a flower. Twice she
deplored the weather, twice criticised the train service on the
Great Northern Railway. They vigorously assented, and rushed on,
and when she inquired whether there was any news of Helen, her
hostess was toomuch occupied in placing Rothenstein to answer.
The question was repeated: "I hope that your sister is safe in
Germany by now." Margaret checked herself and said, "Yes, thank
you; I heard on Tuesday." But the demon of vociferation was in
her, and the nextmoment she was off again.
"Only on Tuesday, for they live right away at Stettin. Did you
ever know any one living at Stettin?"
"Never," said Mrs. Wilcox gravely, while her neighbour, a young
man low down in the Education Office, began to discuss what
people who lived at Stettin ought to look like. Was there such a
thing as Stettininity? Margaret swept on.
"People at Stettin drop things into boats out of overhanging
warehouses. At least, our cousins do, but aren't particularly
rich. The town isn't interesting, except for a clock that rolls
its eyes, and the view of the Oder, which truly is something
special. Oh, Mrs. Wilcox, you would love the Oder! The river, or
rather rivers--there seem to be dozens of them--are intense blue,
and the plain they run through an intensest green."
"Indeed! That sounds like a most beautiful view, Miss Schlegel."
"So I say, but Helen, who will muddle things, says no, it's like
music. The course of the Oder is to be like music. It's obliged
to remind her of a symphonic poem. The part by the landing-stage
is in B minor, if I remember rightly, but lower down things get
extremely mixed. There is a slodgy theme in several keys at once,
meaning mud-banks, and another for the navigable canal, and the
exit into the Baltic is in C sharp major, pianissimo."
"What do the overhanging warehouses make of that?" asked the man,
laughing.
"They make a great deal of it," replied Margaret, unexpectedly
rushing off on a new track. "I think it's affectation to compare
the Oder to music, and so do you, but the overhanging warehouses
of Stettin take beauty seriously, which we don't, and the average
Englishman doesn't, and despises all who do. Now don't say
'Germans have no taste,' or I shall scream. They haven't. But--
but--such a tremendous but!--they take poetry seriously. They do
take poetry seriously."
"Is anything gained by that?"
"Yes, yes. The German is always on the lookout for beauty. He may
miss it through stupidity, or misinterpret it, but he is always
asking beauty to enter his life, and I believe that in the end it
will come. At Heidelberg I met a fat veterinary surgeon whose
voice broke with sobs as he repeated some mawkish poetry. So easy
for me to laugh--I, who never repeat poetry, good or bad, and
cannot remember one fragment of verse to thrill myself with. My
blood boils--well, I 'm half German, so put it down to
patriotism--when I listen to the tasteful contempt of the average
islander for things Teutonic, whether they're Bocklin or my
veterinary surgeon. 'Oh, Bocklin,' they say; 'he strains after
beauty, he peoples Nature with gods too consciously.' Of course
Bocklin strains, because he wants something--beauty and all the
other intangible gifts that are floating about the world. So his
landscapes don't come off, and Leader's do."
"I am not sure that I agree. Do you?" said he, turning to Mrs.
Wilcox.
She replied: "I think Miss Schlegel puts everything splendidly;"
and a chill fell on the conversation.
"Oh, Mrs. Wilcox, say something nicer than that. It's such a snub
to be told you put things splendidly."
"I do not mean it as a snub. Your last speech interested me so
much. Generally people do not seem quite to like Germany. I have
long wanted to hear what is said on the other side."
"The other side? Then you do disagree. Oh, good! Give us your
side."
"I have no side. But my husband"--her voice softened, the chill
increased--"has very little faith in the Continent, and our
children have all taken after him."
"On what grounds? Do they feel that the Continent is in bad
form?"
Mrs. Wilcox had no idea; she paid little attention to grounds.
She was not intellectual, nor even alert, and it was odd that,
all the same, she should give the idea of greatness. Margaret,
zigzagging with her friends over Thought and Art, was conscious
of a personality that transcended their own and dwarfed their
activities. There was no bitterness in Mrs. Wilcox; there was not
even criticism; she was lovable, and no ungracious or
uncharitable word had passed her lips. Yet she and daily life
were out of focus; one or the other must show blurred. And at
lunch she seemed more out of focus than usual, and nearer the
line that divides daily life from a life that may be of greater
importance.
"You will admit, though, that the Continent--it seems silly to
speak of 'the Continent,' but really it is all more like itself
than any part of it is like England. England is unique. Do have
another jelly first. I was going to say that the Continent, for
good or for evil, is interested in ideas. Its Literature and Art
have what one might call the kink of the unseen about them, and
this persists even through decadence and affectation. There is
more liberty of action in England, but for liberty of thought go
to bureaucratic Prussia. People will there discuss with humilit y
vital questions that we here think ourselves too good to touch
with tongs."
"I do not want to go to Prussia," said Mrs. Wilcox "not even to
see that interesting view that you were describing. And for
discussing with humility I am too old. We never discuss anything
at Howards End."
"Then you ought to!" said Margaret. "Discussion keeps a house
alive. It cannot stand by bricks and mortar alone."
"It cannot stand without them," said Mrs. Wilcox, unexpectedly
catching on to the thought, and rousing, for the first and last
time, a faint hope in the breasts of the delightful people. "It
cannot stand without them, and I sometimes think--But I cannot
expect your generation to agree, for even my daughter disagrees
with me here."
"Never mind us or her. Do say!"
"I sometimes think that it is wiser to leave action and
discussion to men."
There was a little silence.
"One admits that the arguments against the suffrage ARE
extraordinarily strong," said a girl opposite, leaning forward
and crumbling her bread.
"Are they? I never follow any arguments. I am only too thankful
not to have a vote myself."
"We didn't mean the vote, though, did we?" supplied Margaret.
Aren't we differing on something much wider, Mrs. Wilcox?
Whether women are to remain what they have been since the dawn of
history; or whether, since men have moved forward so far, they
too may move forward a little now. I say they may. I would even
admit a biological change."
"I don't know, I don't know."
"I must be getting back to my overhanging warehouse," said the
man. "They've turned disgracefully strict."
Mrs. Wilcox also rose.
"Oh, but come upstairs for a little. Miss Quested plays. Do you
like MacDowell? Do you mind his only having two noises? If you
must really go, I'll see you out. Won't you even have coffee?"
They left the dining-room closing the door behind them, and as
Mrs. Wilcox buttoned up her jacket, she said: "What an
interesting life you all lead in London!"
"No, we don't," said Margaret, with a sudden revulsion. "We lead
the lives of gibbering monkeys. Mrs. Wilcox--really-- We have
something quiet and stable at the bottom. We really have. All my
friends have. Don't pretend you enjoyed lunch, for you loathed
it, but forgive me by coming again, alone, or by asking me to
you."
"I am used to young people," said Mrs. Wilcox, and with each word
she spoke the outlines of known things grew dim. "I hear a great
deal of chatter at home, for we, like you, entertain a great
deal. With us it is more sport and politics, but-- I enjoyed my
lunch very much, Miss Schlegel, dear, and am not pretending, and
only wish I could have joined in more. For one thing, I'm not
particularly well just to-day. For another, you younger people
move so quickly that it dazes me. Charles is the same, Dolly the
same. But we are all in the same boat, old and young. I never
forget that."
They were silent for a moment. Then, with a newborn emotion, they
shook hands. The conversation ceased suddenly when Margaret
re-entered the dining-room; her friends had been talking over her
new friend, and had dismissed her as uninteresting.
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